Text | Feng Yanhua
Dear Mothers,
In the past two months, I have hardly slept, and I often wake up crying in the middle of the night, and the grief surrounds me all the time, almost devouring me.
Saying that I will go home for the New Year this year, I will give you the first pot of Chinese New Year's Eve dumplings, and say that I will personally serve it to you, and you will not give your child a chance to do a little filial piety. Mother, you know that I am a very emotionally fragile child, you used to hurt me so much, you loved me, but now, you have left in spite of my grief. You know, I think about you every day.
(The author of this article is an engagement photo of his parents)
At four o'clock in the morning of the twenty-first day of the lunar month, my brother's phone woke me up and said that you were critically ill! Night, pitch black! I couldn't help but grieve and instantly cried into tears.
Jinan back to Boshan, the earliest bus is 6 o'clock, my wife comforted me not to worry, said let your granddaughter-in-law drive us. Why can I not be in a hurry? At that moment, my heart was broken.
I felt that I had only been away from home for a few days, so why did I suddenly become critically ill?
On the eighth day of January, I went home to see you, and in the early morning, I went to buy an early breakfast, and each of us had a meat fire and half a bowl of wontons. At that time, your meal was good and your spirit was good.
After breakfast, take the medicine according to the point, it is aspirin enteric-coated tablets and candesartan ester tablets, I poured water, tasted the heat, and served it to you. You take three tablets at a time, it is difficult to swallow, and you frown. I'm very uncomfortable for you, and I really want to remind you to eat tablets, just like you fed me medicine when I was a child. After all, I can't say it.
You took another sip of water, and I peeled an orange and handed it to you. You eat the orange, and your brow is stretched.
Last year, you suffered from a mild cerebral infarction, had limited mobility in your legs and feet, and had fewer words, but you still insisted on going to the bathroom by yourself. Considering your physical condition, your brother and sister bought you a toilet chair and got up at night in the bedroom. I'm still worried that you'll be unsteady on your feet and wrestle, and you won't dare to fall asleep at night. When I heard you get up at midnight, I immediately went to help you. You say, "I can do it, and you can go to sleep." "You are afraid of affecting my rest.
Brother said that after dinner, we must accompany you to walk more. I walked slowly with you in the living room, and I saw that your right leg was weak. Brother said that you must walk, even if you move, you must go, otherwise, your legs and feet will become more and more unable to move. Tired of walking, I went to sit down on the couch myself, glanced at me, and said I wanted to sit for a while. It looked like a child.
At nine o'clock, the golden sunlight shines softly through the thin window screens in the bedrooms and halls, on your kind and gentle face, on the paintings on the walls of the living room, on you and me, warm. In an instant, the house is quiet, peaceful, warm, like a spring breath that everything on the earth has just sprouted, like a winter day of my childhood memories, and you embrace the time when I told stories. I enjoyed this wonderful time.
I peeled you another orange, and you took it with a smile and ate it and said, "It's sweet!" "In the morning light, your wrinkled face blossoms.
I'm sitting on the little bench across from you, and your smile is so kind. At this moment, I let go of everything and felt that I was the happiest person in the world. I wish I could spend my days with you like this.
I lit a pillar of agarwood incense, and the green smoke rose slowly, and the fragrance filled the whole room for a while. The aroma made me more calm and calm.
I said, "Is the scent OK?" ”
Your nose flutters and you are enchanted by the scent. Half squinting his eyes, he said, "Fragrant! Your grandmother also likes to use this incense. ”
Usually, your words are less, and my brother says that he should talk to you more and let you recall the past more, so that your brain can be active.
I said, "Tell me about grandma." ”
Speaking of grandma, your face is full of smiles. You said, "Your grandmother's family is in Dongding Village, Eight Steep Towns, Boshan, and her family runs a steamed bun shop, and your grandmother is the eldest in the family and has two younger brothers." Grandma had never read a book, couldn't read, but she was quick and accurate in her calculations. At the age of ten, he stood at the door and sold steamed buns, never wrong to post. At this point, your face comes alive and immediately shows a sense of pride. Between the words, all of them reveal your love and longing for your grandmother, and it seems that your youth years have also been activated.
You pulled back to the old thing that I lived in my grandmother's house when I was a child, and you said it so happily. Unconsciously, a pillar of incense burned out, and it seemed that this faint aroma drifted into the long years of the past.
I got up and went to brew a pot of Zhengshan seeds, brought you a cup, you took the cup, did not drink, stared at me and said, "You drink too." "I see that your eyes are full of love...
I wish I could talk to you like this every day. My mother was a big book, but after so many years, I was busy outside and didn't calm down to read it.
The sunshine is just right, I want to let the time slow down, slow down...
You took a sip of tea and then said to me: "When you were a child, you used to live in your grandmother's house, when you were four years old, there were already four of your brothers, the family could not see it, I want to quit my job in the ceramics factory, your grandmother said, Nell, your job can not quit, I will show you the children at home." So, for your sake, your grandmother quit her beloved job. One day, your grandmother was at home with you, and when your grandmother went to cook, you fell in the house and broke your head, bleeding profusely. Fortunately, your uncle was at home, and he hugged you and ran to the hospital, and your grandmother was a little foot, and she also ran. By the time I got to the hospital, your wound had been bandaged. You're no longer crying, and your grandmother is still sobbing. When I got home, I found that your grandmother's blouse was soaked, and I was going to wash your grandmother's clothes, and your grandmother said, go and watch the child. Still blaming myself, saying that I didn't look after the child!
As you speak, you look at the scar on my forehead again.
On this day, you told a lot of stories, and then told the story of the filial piety Yan Wenjiang. You say, "When I was a child, your grandmother used to tell me about it. Yan Wenjiang's mother's family is Boshan Baqiao, and your grandmother is a fellow countryman. "Speaking of which, you're proud.
I said, "You are quite good at telling stories, and you are very good at telling the Tao, there are causes and effects, and you have also said the truth of how some people behave in the world." If you know a lot of words, you can also write books. ”
You laughed and said, "I can write books, and after liberation, I took a literacy class in the factory. ”
I said, "But you know so much." ”
You say, "That's all from the drama and the story." ”
I still remember the stories of "Suolin Capsule", "Bitter Mother-in-Law", "Yue FeiChuan", and "Jade Bracelet" that I heard you tell when I was a child. In my young soul, I also understood some of the truths of knowing gratitude and repaying kindness and loyalty, filial piety, benevolence, and righteousness, which gave me a preliminary understanding of the good, evil, beauty, and ugliness of the world. Listening to the stories you have told may not play much role in our growth, but it is like a seed, as we grow older, it slowly sprouts and grows in our bodies, improving cognition, identifying truth and falsehood, and cultivating emotions. That's the enlightenment of our life thoughts.
"There are five sons, and the mother's family is hard." You and your father both worked in a ceramics factory, and you gave birth to five of our brothers and sisters. When I was a child, it was the era when life was not yet rich, the staple food was mostly coarse grains, and in the small courtyard where we lived, a plate of stone grinding occupied a large half-empty land. I remember living as two large pots of pancakes almost every other day. At 4 o'clock in the morning, the night was hazy, and by the faint light from the house, my father brought a large pot of corn grits to the stone mill, and you and we used the stone grinding to push it into corn paste.
You scoop the grits spoon into the grinder spoon by spoon, the stone grinder makes a "ziz" sound as it turns, and the air is filled with the sour smell of corn grits. At five o'clock, you start spreading pancakes, and by 6:30, you have finished spreading two large pots. You prepare breakfast for us and then hurry to catch up. We must not only feed ourselves, but also never delay our work. The stone mill turns day by day in the years, and we grow up day by day. Thinking of your hard work and hard work, but I can't help it, my heart is full of guilt.
You didn't read a book, and after liberation, you went to literacy classes. I have experienced the years of war, but also suffered from the difficult years of famine and starvation. But in my memory, you did not complain about life without a single word, and always pulled us to live an ordinary life so tirelessly. When you were still working in the factory, your brother joined the army just in time for the war in the south, and there was no letter for several months. Unit leaders and colleagues visited their homes to offer condolences, you are grateful for the care of the organization and colleagues, in front of everyone, there was not a tear. When you send the guest away, you can no longer control your feelings and cry bitterly. You know, there will be sacrifices in war, and there are mothers who don't hurt their sons, but you know better how to love more valuable.
After retirement, the pace of your life is faster. My grandmother, who was over eighty years old, was bedridden and incontinent. You and your aunt and aunt take turns serving. I am always the first to get up in the morning, and I go to bed at the end of the night, and there is no end to the work in the day. She has to take care of her grandmother and her three grandchildren. But you have never been annoyed or complained. With endless strength, he fed Grandma every day, washed a lot of clothes, and scrubbed Grandma's body.
As the saying goes, there is no filial piety in front of the bed for a long time, but you have been waiting for grandma for eight years, until grandma calmly leaves the world. When newspaper reporters heard about you, they went to your door one after another to conduct interviews, and successively introduced your deeds in the Workers' Daily, Shandong Workers' Daily, and Zibo Daily, and were praised as "filial piety and three concubines." When I read the newspaper to you, you calmly said that taking care of the elderly is the right thing to do.
Mother, in fact, you don't know that in the 1990s, your story has long been spread throughout the ten miles and eight townships and the land of Luzhong. All of them touch and educate us. Boshan is the birthplace of filial piety culture, and those beautiful stories and legends will inspire and educate generations of people. You often tell us, "It is better to honor our parents at home than to burn incense from afar." "You did it." Mother's holy goodness, I have no man. ”
On the day I got back to town, you sat on the matza in the living room and said, "You're going to work again?" ”
I said, "I'll be back in twenty days for the New Year, and I'll give you Chinese New Year's Eve dumplings." I also wrote some new stories to come back to you. Go back to your bedroom and rest for a while. "You said, I watched you go and watched me walk out.
Unexpectedly, those two days became the last time to accompany you to talk.
Since 2009, I have said goodbye to my hometown and come to the provincial city, and I have less time to go home to see you. You comforted me and said, "If you work, you are a public person, and if you can come home old, we are all very good." ”
Every time you leave home, you always have to look at me and walk away. The moment I walked out of the door, a sense of guilt rose in my heart, the usual companionship was too little, too little, the heart was faintly painful, and the needle was pricked. Somehow, tears flowed down.
Mother, you did not say a word to us from the time you were hospitalized until you died at 92:00 on the first day of the first month. Say well I have a lot of stories to tell you, and you can't listen to me anymore. From hospitalization to death, in the days of your hospitalization, your children waited for you, asked for doctors, asked for prescriptions, and despite many treatments, they still failed to save your life.
At the time of death, the little sister held your hand tightly, tearing her heart and lungs and crying: "Mom, you open your eyes to see me again!" "But you never opened your eyes again. That's when I realized that you were really gone from your children, and my tears were pouring out. "There are five sons, and mo comforts the mother's heart."
People who visit you at home say that the old man is eighty-nine years old and has a high life expectancy. But I couldn't control my grief.
In your fifth term, I went back to the grave, walked into the door again, went into your bedroom, and everything was the same, as if you were sitting on the sofa in the living room watching TV. I picked up the family portrait on my desk, and my tears blurred.
Relatives are busy coming and going for the sake of the memorial. While sorting out the clothes to be taken to the grave for you, the little sister sobbed and said, "Brother, my parents are gone, we must come to the house often!" "I listened, and a great sense of sadness struck me. In the past, when it came to holidays, my wife and children and I were like arrows, thinking that we could step into this home in one step. When your parents are gone, the meaning of home is completely different. I turned my head and let the tears run down my face.
(2017 author mother in Jinan)
Mother, I would also like to tell you that on the day you left, your granddaughter was 7 months pregnant and could not give you a final ride. She cried at home and became a tearful person. After persuasion from his family, he calmed down. Today, your granddaughter has given birth to a big fat boy. At this time, I want to share this happiness with you!
Tomorrow is the Qingming Festival, because of the severe situation of the epidemic, we can't go back to your grave, here and you said such a lot of words, I believe you have heard, this is our thoughts about you. Thinking that I would not be able to Chinese New Year's Eve dumplings for you again, I read to you a poem I made for you:
Mother's dumplings
Childhood
Mother's dumplings are the taste of the year
I don't know how my mother conjured up the laughing "yuanbao"
We eagerly enjoy putting the year and happiness in the collection
Frolicking and melting in again
The sweet smell of firecrackers pervades
Fei Xue was also happy to accompany me
Home at that time
Mother with dexterous hands
Put the days of this strain
The paving was as beautiful as her beautiful youth
Got married
Mother's dumplings are flowers blooming in the heart
A thin layer of dumpling skin
Wrapped in love, wrapped in anticipation, wrapped in dark incense
With hope descend into the boiling holy water of life
Life is overflowing with fragrance
When spring is in full swing
A cry of the next generation
Since then, my mother has become busier
After leaving home
Mother's dumplings are haunting dreams
How many times have I not been home
Mother's weak hands could still knead the dough
Whether the filling on the chopping board is still similar
Old time tender
"Son, eat a few more."
Go out dumplings and home noodles. ”
Several times I heard my mother's soft call in my sleep
How many years, to know the past years
Never understood the depth of maternal love
The hot dumplings and the ancient clouds of the hometown became
The thoughts of the son's family
Now
The mother's dumplings are the son's faint sorrow and sorrow
Some bitterness, some sadness
Back home
Suddenly, I found that my mother was so old
But the fine lines are still overflowing with joy
It was hard to do for my son
Dumplings that symbolize reunion and happiness
I wish I could make dumplings for my mother
No matter how close and caressed the son
I can no longer soothe the traces of my mother's years
Mother's flower-like youth has become a shadow
The frost and snow above her mother's head
It stung the son's warm atrium
Mother, I am proud to be your son in this life, and we will always love you!
You have gone to be reunited with your father and wish you happiness in heaven.
Your beloved son
Cold Food Festival 2022
About author:Feng Yanhua, born in October 1963 in Zibo, Shandong, is the vice chairman of the Shandong Financial Writers Association, the member of the Shandong Writers Association, the member of the China Financial Writers Association, the chinese essayist association, and the director of the Liuquan Poetry Association. His works have appeared in Shandong Literature, Times Literature, Contemporary Novels, Financial Literature, Chinese Financial Literature, Contemporary Essays, Qilu Evening News, Qi Feng, etc. Together with his brother Feng Yanwei, he published two collections of essays, "Spring Dream" and "Ancient Kiln Rhymes"; two novels, "Nirvana" and "Chairman of the Trade Union"; among them, the essay collection "Ancient Kiln Rhymes" won the 2006-2007 Zibo Excellent Literature Award. "Nirvana" won the gold medal of the ICBC National Financial Literature Competition in 2011, the Chinese Financial Literature Award and was included in the "Contemporary Financial Literature Series", and in 2021, it was selected into the first new era industrial literature (employee literature) publishing funding project of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions and the China Workers Publishing House. "Chairman of the Trade Union" won the China Financial Literature New Work Award, the 11th Zibo Literature and Art Award, and was designated by the All-China Federation of Trade Unions and the China Workers Publishing House to distribute books to the National Trade Union Staff Bookstore. The short story "Crystal Tears" won the third prize for the short story essay "The Story of a Financial Man" celebrating the 40th anniversary of reform and opening up. His essays have won many awards at the national and provincial levels. He currently works for Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Shandong Branch.
One point number Shandong financial literature